A proud unapologetic Black trans woman speaking truth to power and discussing the world around her since 2006

Monday, May 14, 2012

Early Voting Starts Today In Texas Primaries

No thanks to the redistricting chicanery the Republifools tried to pull in the Lone Star State and got called on by federal judges and the Department of Justice, the electoral primary elections that normally happen in March got pushed back to May 29.

Karma is a witch ain't it GOP? If you hadn't tried to frack with us non-white people ability to vote or tired to lock in you ill gotten Delaymandered supermajority you would have been able to have a major say in whether Willard would be the presumptive GOP presidential nominee.

But I can needle y'all Texas Republifools about your overreach later. Back to our regularly scheduled TransGriot post. .

Since we have early voting in Texas, that gets cranked up today and runs through May 25. If any of the races require a runoff, the two two candidates will square off off for their party's general election nomination on July 31

If you live in Harris County (the county that Houston is in for you geographically challenged people) here's the info specific to us via the Harris Vote website.

You can access the primary candidate ballots for both parties, find out where the 37 countywide early voting polling places are located, and if you missed the cutoff date for getting registered to vote for the primary can still get it done so your behind will be eligible for the November 6 general election.

The information for the rest of Texas is here. You can also go to the website specific to your county for local polling place info as well or pick up a voter registration card at your local US post office, fill it out and mail it postage free.

To be eligible to register to vote in the Lone Star State, a person must be:

A United States citizen;

A resident of the Texas county in which application for registration is made;

At least 18 years old on Election Day;

Not finally convicted of a felony, or, if so convicted must
have (1) fully discharged the sentence, including any term of
incarceration, parole, or supervision, or completed a period of
probation ordered by any court; or (2) been pardoned or otherwise
released from the resulting disability to vote; and

Not determined by a final judgment of a court exercising
probate jurisdiction to be (1) totally mentally incapacitated; or (2)
partially mentally incapacitated without the right to vote.

As for that odious Voter ID Suppression law the Republifools passed and Governor Goodhair signed,.that got legally pimp slapped thanks to the DOJ and the 1965 Voting Rights Act. The conservafools that run this state for now are appealing ti, but odds are long that they will reverse it.

The law was clearly shown to have a deleterious discriminatory impact on Latino voters, and it's not too far an extrapolation to deduce that it would have had the same jacked up effects on African-Americans and other targeted groups for suppression such as college students and seniors as well.

And conservafools, spare me the what's wrong with requiring an ID to vote to prevent voter fraud spin line you'll send me in the comment sections. We've has less than 12 people arrested in over a decade of elections out of millions of votes cast and know what the real deal is in terms of motivating your faux concern for stamping out voter fraud..

We are quite aware you conservapeeps define 'voter fraud' as massive numbers of non-white and liberal voters lining up at the polls to put Democrats in office

We know as part of your scheme to make a certain Democrat residing at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave a one-termer y'all rushed these unconstitutuional laws to passage in 34 states after the 2010 midterms.

So with the Voter ID Suppression Law being struck down, that means all you'll have to do is present your new yellow voter registration card they should have mailed you already when you show up at the local polling place to cast your ballot.

If you have any drama doing so, notify your local or the Texas state NAACP chapters

This is the first step for you liberal progressive Texans on the long road we have to making our state more progressive and one we can be proud of.

So handle your civic duty, thank you for caring enough about who runs this state and your counties to do so and see y'all at the polls.

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About The TransGriot

Monica Roberts, AKA the TransGriot (Gree-oh) is a native Houstonian, GLAAD award nominated blogger, writer, and award winning trans human rights advocate. She's the founding editor of TransGriot, and her writing has appeared at the Bilerico Project, Ebony.com, The Huffington Post and the Advocate.
She works to foster understanding and acceptance of trans people inside and outside communities of color and was recently honored with the Virginia Prince Transgender Pioneer Award

TransGriot Blog Mission Statement

The TransGriot blog's mission is to become the griot of our community. I will introduce you to and talk about your African descended trans brothers and trans sisters across the Diaspora, reclaim and document our chocolate flavored trans history, speak truth to power, comment on the things that impact our trans community from an Afrocentric perspective and enlighten you about the general things that go on around me and in the communities that I am a member of.

--Mission Statement compiled January 2, 2011

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